


I Am Not My Hair

by halfwit



Series: In Sickness and In Health [5]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Accountant Castiel, Doctor Dean, Domestic destiel, Fluff, Gabriel's a great big brother, I still stink at tagging, M/M, Married Castiel/Dean Winchester, Married Destiel, Mentions of Cancer, Sam is a great little brother, Screw Cancer, Sick Dean, Sick Dean Winchester, Supportive Castiel, Supportive Gabriel, Supportive Sam, just a big ball of fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-12
Updated: 2015-06-12
Packaged: 2018-04-04 01:55:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4121848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfwit/pseuds/halfwit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel comes home from a long day at the office to find that his husband and brother have a small surprise for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Am Not My Hair

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a series, but I have been trying to write them in such a way that you really don't need to have the full knowledge of the prior parts to read along .

This day absolutely hated Castiel Novak.

He was supposed to be at the hospital supporting his husband through his first chemotherapy treatment post tumor removal surgery. However, his stick-up-the-butt boss Zachariah decided Castiel's quarterly projections needed to be revised, again, requiring the junior accountant to stay late. Thankfully, Castiel's older brother Gabriel was able to take Dean to the appointment.

Struggling to maintain a grip on his briefcase and travel mug from his morning coffee, Castiel no sooner got out of the car and started walking up the cement steps leading to his and Dean's house that the heavens decided to open up and soak Castiel to the bone.

Of freaking course. That was just his luck for the day.

Sighing, the raven haired man fumbled to keep hold on his parcels while fumbling with slippery fingers to maneuver the keys into the lock. After three attempts, he finally was successful in clicking the key into place and turning the lock. The warmth of his and Dean's home immediately started to relax him and bear back the stresses of the day.

Hanging up his drenched tan trench coat on the rack by the door, Castiel hoped the fabric would dry by morning. If not, he guessed he could throw it into the dryer, although he was afraid the material would shrink. Dean often teased his husband that Castiel loved that cost more than he loved Dean. It wasn't his fault he was sentimental. That coat meant a lot to him; it had weathered many a storm with the young Novak.

Speaking of his husband, Castiel rounded the corner and found the living room empty. The television was dark and there was no sign of Dean...or Gabe. That was odd, Castiel frowned as he walked through the house. They should definitely be home by now, and there was no way Gabriel was leaving Dean alone after his treatment. The older Novak might be a notorious prankster and often flighty, but he loved Dean as though the younger man were his brother, no way was he shirking in his duty. So, the question was where were the Dynamic Duo?

"Dean? Gabe?" Castiel called out, walking to his and Dean's bedroom. He figured he might as well strip out of his wet clothes.

Loosening his tie, he thought he heard a faint buzzing sound and some tired giggling, but no one returned his call.

"Hello?" he called out again, unbuttoning the top buttons of his soaked white dress shirt. "Anyone home?"

The nearby bathroom door snicked open and he heard his older brother call out a greeting from inside.

"We're in here Cassiopeia," Gabriel sing-songed.

Castiel rolled his eyes at his brother's outrageous nickname, but was curious as to why both of his guys were in the bathroom together.

"Is everything alright?" Castiel queried, pushing the door open and stepping through. "How did the treatment..."

The younger Novak found his words die in his throat as he walked into the bathroom. The scene in front of him momentarily robbed him of all powers of speech.

"Whaddya think, baby?" Dean asked his stunned husband. The green-eyed man was grinning like a loon, even though Castiel could see the lingering pain and fear lurking in his husband's gorgeously expressive forest green eyes.

"I, um, well, I, um," Castiel fumbled for words. He normally considered himself a rather eloquent man, sure he was an accountant and numbers were more his milieu than words, but he had been known to string together perfect beautiful sentences in the past. However, the scene in front of him had fried his brain circuitry and left him rather tongue tied.

"Oh lighten up, Casmeister," Gabriel teased clapping his younger brother on the shoulder with a mega watt grin. "At least close your mouth so you don't catch any flies."

"What happened?" the blue-eyed Novak finally was able to choke out.

"Nothing happened," Dean replied a little too quickly. Catching the obviously disbelieving glanced and arched eyebrow thrown at him by his husband, Dean knew his paltry explanation wasn't going to suffice.

Sighing, Dean ran his hand tiredly over his eyes, which were starting to itch and burn from fatigue; he had forgotten how much these treatments took out of him, even more so now that he wasn't a teenager anymore.

"We were finishing up and Benny told me that because of the aggressive dosage of the drugs, it was highly likely that I was going to lose my hair," the Winchester confessed somewhat sadly. "I wasn't expecting that, it kinda made me sad."

Castiel looked at his husband compassionately. He knew that while Dean was not usually a vain man, the unknown and the disease forcing changes in him would be a bitter pill for him to swallow.

"So, after he unhooked me, I found myself wandering through the Peds cancer ward before meeting up with shorty here," Dean said, gesturing affectionately toward his brother-in-law.

"Hey!" Gabriel grumbled. "It's not my fault my brother decided to marry into a family of yeti."

"Anyhow," Dean continued, completely ignoring the other man, "I ran into a former patient of mine named Rachel. She was sitting quietly reading but she looked up when I entered and looked so happy to see me. She had just a bandana wrapped around her head, and I realized it was because she was bald.

"I must have been staring more pointedly than I thought because the next thing I knew she removed the covering and revealed perfectly smooth skin.

"She said it was a hard transition, at first. She had thick, dark brown hair before. But, when it started coming out, she made the decision to take control of what was happening to her. She didn't want to wait and mourn the loss of her hair. If it was going to go, then she was going to be the one who made it happen. Fuck cancer."

Dean was smiling, not as bright as he usually did, but a genuine enough smile that reflected I his eyes, making them twinkle like emerald orbs.

"Though totally unprofessional and something I would forever deny, I kissed her in the top of her little cue ball and thanked her for her courage," Dean continued. "I walked out of the treatment rooms and practically ran into Tiny who was doing his best to wear a hole in the waiting room floor."

"I was bored," Gabriel protested weakly. "My phone's battery died an hour before and I could play Candy Crush any more. I didn't know what else I could do."

"Likely story," Dean shot back.

"Dean, that is a beautiful story" Castiel gently prodded his husband, "but it still doesn't explain what I am looking at."

"After hearing Rachel's story and how strong she was able to be, even though she is just a kid herself, I felt kinda silly about my reactions."

Castiel wanted to defend his husband and say that Dean still was a young man himself and that his reaction was normal; but, the dark-haired man knew Dean would not see himself as anything but wrong. This was a battle Castiel wasn't going to be able to win.

"When Deannie Bear told me the story, I told him I had the perfect solution," Gabe chimed in, not wanting to miss his shining moment in the story. "I herded him straight for the bathroom and took the liberty of removing the first strip of hair myself, although he had to get the rest, frikkin' gargantuan genes, I would have had to climb him like a sequoia to get the rest and I didn't have enough energy."

"Okay," Castiel replied slowly, as though talking to a child, "that explains part of it,"

"Well what else is there to explain," Gabriel asked, a hint of irritation lacing his previously jocular tone.

"He wants to know where your hair went, too, wise ass," Dean said with an exasperated, yet fond, eye roll.

"My hair is gone, too," Gabriel shrieked running toward the mirror and running his hands helplessly over the smooth globe where once lush honey brown locks had been.

The younger brother didn't know what to say. He didn't know how to comfort his brother. He was just getting ready to wrap the smaller man into an embrace when Gabriel started snickering at his reflection in the mirror.

"Gotcha!" Gabriel said with a pleased grin. "Seriously Cassie, messin' with you ain't even fun anymore. You are way too easy.

"Although I have to say, I am a little hurt. You should know there was no way I was gonna sit here and let Dean do this by himself - solidarity among brothers and all that."

Castiel felt his eyes grow moist with the knowledge of what the two had done and how much Gabe had been able to support his husband. The younger Novak was doubly upset that he hadn't been there, stupid financial reports. Castiel could see Dean was touched by Gabe's comment as well.

"That and now I have a killer story to tell the ladies, I am definitely going to be getting laid," the shorter man said, dispelling the heavy mood in the room.

Castiel wrapped his husband and brother into a tight embrace and whispered, "I love you and am so proud of you," in to each of their ears.

And if Castiel Novak, CPA, walked into his boss' office the next morning to present the quarterly financial reports to the Board of Directors sporting considerably less coif than he had the previous day, his only answer to them was, "I am showing solidarity and support to my husband who is in treatment for cancer."

Zachariah may have threatened to fire his shiny, bald Captain Picard head, but the Board enthusiastically embraced his decision, and loved his financial projections and presentation so much, they recommended him for a promotion.

Later that night, Dean’s eyes shone brightly and Castiel even had to gasp in surprise when the couple Skyped with Dean’s younger brother, Sam. Obviously the younger Winchester had been in touch with the trickster Novak. However, what brought a fresh round of tears sparkling to Dean’s eyes was the sight of his brother’s normally chin-length shaggy brown hair, completely sheared away leaving a freshly sheared head as free from hair as Dean’s own.

“Sammy,” Dean choked out, overcome with love and appreciation for what his brother had done for him.

“What?” the young man said, striving for an innocent tone, “Is there something wrong, Dean?”

The older brother shook his head rapidly, indicating that no there really wasn’t anything wrong.

“After all,” Sam said with a suspicious sheen to his own hazel eyes, “I have long since learned from someone who’ve I’ve looked up to since I was four - I am not my hair.”

**Author's Note:**

> This story kind of got stuck in my head - I just saw Dean doing this to say screw you to cancer. Plus, after the somewhat emotional upheaval of the last part of this series, I thought this would give us a nice little break from the heavy drama. Plus, I think all of them would look absolutely adorable with little bald heads.
> 
> Also, I absolutely love Gabriel in this universe. I usually have a problem writing him, but with this dynamic, he just seems to work. I love the friendship he has with Dean and how they can play off each other.
> 
> One scene I toyed with putting in the story as an epilogue, but omitted because I didn't think it fit, was that year for the holidays Dean and Cas' Christmas cards featured four bald men sitting around the Christmas tree drinking egg nog out of the girliest cups they possibly could find. A magazine editor was friends with someone who received the Winchester-Novak Christmas card and ended up doing a story about families who supported their loved ones to the extreme during cancer treatments.
> 
> I will say that I wrote this under extremely sleep deprived conditions and between a six-year-old throwing up during the night. Any mistakes, as always, are my own. Let me know what you thought - I love to hear from you.
> 
> All my best :-)


End file.
